“I would like to open a door”—the sentence was uttered by a prisoner on death row for decades now, in San Quentin. For decades now he has not touched the handle of a door. California has repudiated capital punishment, but when Jarvis Masters was sentenced to death the gas chambers were still . . .
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Editor’s note: On Wednesday, December 7, in the Paradise Room of the Smith College Conference Center, Ruth Ozeki gave a lecture titled “The Book of Form and Emptiness: Zen and the Art of Actualizing Fiction.” Provost Michael Thurston introduced the speaker, and his remarks follow here, as does Ruth Ozeki’s sabbatical report, . . .
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Why settle for a beer cocktail when you can enjoy a boozy beer? As the holidays come round againAnd you gather with family and friends,Boozy beers make us merryWith malt, chocolate, cherry,And spice. Here are six I commend. 1.For a booze-infused brew you’ll repeat,Try this toffee-hued ale for a treat.From oak barrels . . .
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Bill Ehrhart at Oakland Cemetery, West Chester, PA(Photo: Terry Griffith) So here I am with Smedley Butler,Major General, Maverick Marine,Old Gimlet Eye, the Stormy Petrel,two-time Medal of Honor winner;me a sergeant with a Purple Heartfor doing nothing but getting hit.(Don’t kid yourself, there’s nothingheroic in that; just bad luck.) Yet here I . . .
Read MoreNOT BETTER YET Methods of Care for the Precarious Body PANTEHA ABARESHI is a Canadian-born American multidisciplinary artist and curator. They are based in Los Angeles, California and were raised in Tucson. Abareshi was born with sickle cell zero beta thalassemia, a genetic blood disorder that causes debilitating pain, and bodily deterioration . . .
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“I slid my hand down and clasped the small pair of tweezers I’d placed in my pocket before leaving for work that morning. […] A recent habit of mine. Big or small, holding a solid object put my mind at ease—as if its hardness was preparing me for something.”—from The Lake, by Kang . . .
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In the country, I could be better. I could learn to weave baskets and identify edible plants. I could learn to sew, to sing, to wear my hair in loose braids that tickle my bare shoulders. Believe me, I know how it sounds. I know my reasons for wanting this life seem . . .
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Leila Chatti’s collection Figment is out now with Bull City Press. Her poem “Still Life with Hemorrhage” was published in MR Vol. 58, Issue 3. MR Poetry Editor Franny Choi’s latest collection, The World Keeps Ending, and the World Goes On, is out now from Ecco/HarperCollins. “Blessing the Exoskeleton” the latest collection from Andrew Hemmert is out now . . .
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In California, in a dumpster, a rattler layhalf-coiled atop a grease-soaked pizza box, half-cloaked by yesterday’s news.It was no friend of mine, the snake, though, to tell the truth, in such repose, no enemyeither.—from “It’s Never Just a Snake,” Vol. 63, Issue 3 (Fall 2022) Tell us about one of the . . .
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Ambahy—konantitra, I cannot comprehend this power that you wield. . . The power of death’s morbid attraction, of the will to turn toward anarchy, toward a world where nothing is sacred anymore, where nothing has more power than its own form . . . I do not know. Intense desire for emancipation . . .
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